An Act of Love by Nancy Thayer Page A

Hedden.’ ”
    “Oh, sweetie,” Linda said.
    “I waited till I heard him shut his bedroom door. I ran into the bathroom andlocked the door and stayed there all night. The next day I called Rosie to see if she could use me for a baby-sitter. I said I’d do it for free, my last chance to be with Sean before I left for school, but she said no, Sean was sick, I shouldn’t come over. So I took food and went out in the woods and stayed there and read all day and that night I took a blanket and hid in the barn, but he found me, and he laughed at me. He goes, ‘You stupid little sack of shit, don’t you know I’ll always be able to find you? This is my farm.’ And … he did it again. He raped me again. I was crying and fighting the whole time. When he was through, he went up to his room. And I stayed there till you and Owen came home.”
    Linda remembered returning to the farm on that brilliant day. Summer was not yet gone, but there had been an autumnal clarity and a light to the air, as if the landscape were gilt-edged. Owen and she had spent three nights together in a cabin in Maine at a writers’ conference, and three days of talking with other writers about their work. They were closer than they’d been in a long time, and happier. It had been really idyllic, the romance of the ocean, the luxury of all meals prepared, no housework looming, the exhilaration of discussing their work, the pleasure of talking with people whose lives were centered on books.
    Linda had been hoping that Bruce and Emily had finished packing and organizing their things for the new semester at Hedden. She’d been hoping that they’d done the dishes and left the house in a reasonable state of disorder. She’d been wondering what was in the freezer she could thaw out for dinner.
    Where had Emily and Bruce been? The horses had ambled up to the fence and bobbed their heads and Maud had waddled out to greet them.
    Linda thought hard: Bruce was in his room, grumbling over his laundry, and Emily was in her room, yes, that was right. They hadn’t come down to say hello or ask how the conference had been, and Linda had just assumed they were preoccupied, thinking of the next day, when they would leave for school.
    Now Emily lifted her face to her mother. It was a terrifying, heartbreaking sight, so contorted with emotion, her lips pulled down and back in a hideous grimace, saliva bubbling as she wailed, “Mommy, he hurt me!”
    Linda rose and in three steps was next to her daughter. Bending over, she wrapped herself around Emily and held her as she cried. “Oh, baby,” she murmured, stroking her back.
    “Emily, why didn’t you tell us this before now?” Owen asked.
    “Yes,” Linda agreed. “You should have told us the moment we got home.”
    Emily cringed. She dug at her hands. “I was embarrassed. I was afraid of what Bruce would say. I didn’t want to make you guys unhappy. I thought if I got pregnant, then I’d have to tell you. I made a deal with God that I wouldn’t tell you if He wouldn’t make me pregnant.”
    Linda’s knees went weak. “Are you—”
    “No.”
    Linda reached for her chair and sank back down into it.
    Softly Owen asked, “Why are you telling us now, Emily?”
    “Because I don’t know what else to do. Because Thanksgiving is here and I don’t want to go back to the farm anymore. It scares me.”
    “The farm scares you.”
    “Yes. Because of what Bruce did.”
    Owen cleared his throat. “Are you sure … are you sure it was rape?”
    Linda said, “Owen.”
    Emily leaned forward, hands clenched into fists. “You see, Mom! You see how you let him talk to me? How you let him speak to me? I hate you both! ”
    “Emily, please, we’re just trying to understand …”
    “ I fought him . I yelled and told him no, and tried to get away, but he held me down. He hurt me . He told me he hates me.”
    Linda shook her head as if to clear it. “I can’t take it in. It’s impossible.”
    “It’s the